A Crooked Mile Part 15

"The dream of creating offspring without the concurrence of woman has always haunted the imagination of the human race. The miraculous advances which the chemical synthesis has accomplished in these latter days seem to justify the boldest hopes, but we are still far from the creation of living protoplasm. The experiences of Loeb or of Delage are undoubtedly very confounding. But in order to produce life these scientists were obliged, nevertheless; to have recourse to beings already organized. Thousands of centuries undoubtedly separate us from any possibility of realizing the most magnificent and most disconcerting dream ever engendered in the human brain. In the meantime, as the Torch of Life must be transmitted to the succeeding generations, woman will continue gloriously to fulfil her character of mother."--"Problems of the s.e.xes," Jean Finot; 12_s._ 6_d._ net; p. 352.

Lightly worked up and chattily treated, this theme, as Katie said, drew quiet smiles of appreciation from every cultured audience which Walter addressed.

III

THE IMPERIALISTS

They were great believers in the Empire, they on the "Novum." Indeed, they were the only true Imperialists, since they recognized that ideas, and not actions, were by far and away the most potent instruments in the betterment of mankind. Everybody who was anybody knew that, a mere sporadic outbreak here and there (such as the one in Manchuria) notwithstanding, war had been virtually impossible ever since the publication of M. Bloch's book declaring it to be so. What, they asked, was war, more than an unfortunate miscalculation on the part of the lamb that happened to lie down with the lion? And what made the miscalculation so unfortunate? Why, surely the possession by the lion of teeth and claws. Draw his teeth and cut his claws, and the two would slumber peacefully together. So with the British lion. He only fought because he had things ready to fight with. Philosophically, his aggressions were not much more than a kind of sportive manifestation of the joy of life, that happened, rather inconsequentially, to take the form of the joy of death. Take away the ships and guns, then, and everything would be all right.

These views on the Real Empire were in no way incompatible with Mr.

Wilkinson's desire to see all Trade Unionists armed. For a war at home, about shorter hours and higher wages, would at any rate be a war between equals in race. It was wars between unequals that had made of the Old Empire so hideous a thing. Amory herself had more than once stated this rather well.

"I call it cowardice," she had said. "Every fine instinct in us tells us to stick up for the weaker side. It makes my blood boil! Think of those gentle and dusky millions, all being, to put it in a word, bullied--just bullied! We all know the kind of man who goes abroad--the conventional 'adventurer' (I like 'adventurer!') He's just a common bully. He drinks disgustingly, and swears, and kicks people who don't get out of his way--but he's always careful to have a revolver in his pocket for fear they should hit him back!... And he makes a tremendous fuss about his white women, but when it comes to their black or brown ones ... well, anyway, _I_ think he's a brute, and we want a better cla.s.s of man than _that_ for our readers!"

And that was briefly why, at the "Novum," they tried to reduce armaments at home, and gave at least moral encouragement to the other side whenever there was a dust-up abroad.

But it had been some time ago that Amory had said all this, and her att.i.tude since then had undergone certain changes. One of these changes had been her acquisition of the Romantic Point of View; another had been that suspended state of affairs between herself and Mr. Strong. The first of these curtailed a good deal of the philosophy in which Mr.

Strong always seemed anxious to enwrap the subject (in order, as far as Amory could see, to avoid action). It also made a little more of the position of women, white, black or brown, and especially when rolled up in carpets, in Imperial affairs. And the second, that hung-up relation between Edgar Strong and herself, had left her constantly wondering what would have happened had she taken Mr. Strong at his word and fled to Paris with him, and exactly where they stood since she had not done so.

For naturally, things could hardly have been expected to be the same after that. Since Edgar had ceased to come quite so frequently to The Witan, Amory had thought the whole situation carefully over and had come to her conclusion. Perhaps the histories of _les grandes maitresses_ and the writings of Key had helped her; or, more likely, Key in Sweden (or wherever it was) and herself in England had arrived at the same conclusion by independent paths. That conclusion, stated in three words, was the Genius of Love.

It was perfectly simple. Why had Amory Towers, the painter of that picture ("Barrage") so enthusiastically acclaimed by the whole of Feminist England, now for so long ceased to paint? What had become of the Genius that had brought that picture into being? It is certain that Genius cannot be stifled. Deny it one opportunity and it will break out somewhere else--in another art, in politics, in leadership in one form or another, or it may be even in crime.

Even so, Amory was conscious, her own Genius had refused to be suppressed. It had found another outlet in politics, directed in a rec.u.mbent att.i.tude from a sofa.

Yet that had landed her straightway in a dilemma--the dilemma of Edgar and the twins, of Paris on seven francs a day and the comforts Cosimo allowed her, of a deed that was to have put even that of the Wyrons into the shade and a mere settling down to the prospect of seeing Edgar when it pleased him to put in an appearance.

She had not seen this protean property of Genius just at first. That could only have been because she had not examined herself sufficiently.

She had been introspective, but not introspective enough.

And lest she should be mistaken in the mighty changes that were going on within herself, at first she had tried the painting again. Her tubes were dry and her brushes hard, but she had got new ones, and one after another she had taken up her old half-finished canvases again. A single glance at them had filled her with astonishment at the leagues of progress, mental and emotional, that she had made since then. She had laughed almost insultingly at those former attempts. That large canvas on the "_Triumph of Humane Government_" was positively frigid! And Edgar had liked it!... Well, that only showed what a power she now had over Edgar if she only cared to use it. If he had liked that chilly piece of cla.s.sicism, he would stand dumb before the canvas that every faculty in her was now straining to paint. She began to think that canvas out....

It must be Eastern, of course; nay, it must be The East--tremendously voluptuous and so on. She would paint it over the "_Triumph_." It should be bathed in a sunrise, rabidly yellow (they had no time for decaying mellowness in those vast and kindling lands to which Amory's inner eye was turned)--and of course there ought to be a many-breasted what-was-her-name in it, the G.o.ddess (rather rank, perhaps, but that was the idea, a smack at effete occidental politeness). And there ought to be a two-breasted figure as well, perhaps with a cord or something in her hand, hauling up the curtain of night, or at any rate showing in some way or other that her superb beauty was actually responsible for the yellow sunrise....

And above all, she must get _herself_ into it--the whole of herself--all that tremendous continent that Cosimo had not had, that her children had not had, that her former painting had left unexpressed, that politics had not brought out of her....

The result of that experiment was remarkable. Two days later she had thrown the painting aside again. It was a ghastly failure. But only for a moment did that depress her; the next moment she had seen further. She was a Genius; she knew it--felt it; she was so sure about it that she would never have dreamed of arguing about it; she had such thoughts sometimes.... And Genius could never be suppressed. Very well; the Eastern canvas was a total failure; she admitted it. Ergo, her Genius was for something else than painting.

That was all she had wanted to know.

For what, then? No doubt Edgar Strong, who had enlightened her about herself before, would be able to enlighten her again now. And if he would not come to see her, she must go and see him. But already she saw the answer shining brightly ahead. She must pant, not paint; live, not limn. Her Genius was, after all, for Love.

True, at the thought of those offices in Charing Cross Road she had an instinctive shrinking. Their shabbiness rather took the shine out of the voluptuousnesses she had tried, and failed, to get upon her canvas. But perhaps there was a fitness in that too. Genius, whether in Art or in Love, is usually poor. If she could be splendid there she could be so anywhere. No doubt heaps and heaps of grand pa.s.sions had transfigured grimy garrets, and had made of them perfectly ripping backgrounds....

So on an afternoon in mid-January Amory put on her new velvet costume of glaucous sea-holly blue and her new mushroom-white hat, and went down to the "Novum's" offices in a taxi. It seemed to her that she got there horribly quickly. Her heart was beating rapidly, and already she had partly persuaded herself that if Edgar wasn't in it might perhaps be just as well, as she had half-promised the twins to have tea with them in the nursery soon, and anyway she could come again next week. Or she might leave Edgar a note to come up to The Witan. There were familiar and supporting influences at The Witan. But here she felt dreadfully defenceless.... She reached her destination. Slowly she pa.s.sed through the bas.e.m.e.nt-room with the sandwich-boards, ascended the dark stairs, and walked along the upper corridor that was hung with the specimens of poster-art.

Edgar was in. He was sitting at his roll-top desk, with his feet thrust into the unimaginable litter of papers that covered it. He appeared to be dozing over the "Times," and had not drunk the cup of tea that stood at his elbow with a sodden biscuit and a couple of lumps of sugar awash in the saucer.--Without turning his head he said "Hallo," almost as if he expected somebody else. "Did you bring me some cigarettes in?" he added, still not turning. And this was a relief to Amory's thumping heart. She could begin with a little joke.

"No," she said. "I didn't know you wanted any."

There was no counterfeit about the start Mr. Strong gave. So swiftly did he pluck his feet away from the desk that twenty sheets of paper planed down to the floor, bringing the cup of tea with them in their fall.

But Mr. Strong paid no attention to the breakage and mess. He was on his feet, looking at Amory. He looked, but he had never a word to say. And she stood looking at him--charming in her glaucous blue, the glint of rich red that peeped from under the new white hat, and her slightly frightened smile.

"Haven't you any?" she said archly.

At that Mr. Strong found his tongue.

"Excuse me just a moment," he muttered, striding past her and picking up something from his desk as he went. "Sit down, won't you?" Then he opened the door by which Amory had entered, did something behind it, and returned, closing the door again. "Only so that we shan't be disturbed,"

he said. "They go into the other office when they see the notice.--I wasn't expecting you."

Nor did he, Amory thought, show any great joy at her appearance. On the contrary, he had fixed a look very like a glare on her. Then he walked to the hearth. A big fire burned there behind a wire guard, and within the iron kerb stood the kettle he had boiled to make tea. He put his elbows on the mantelpiece and turned his back to her. Again it was Mr.

Brimby's sorrowing Oxford att.i.tude. Amory had moved towards his swivel chair and had sat down. Her heart beat a little agitatedly. He remembered!...

He spoke without any beating about the bush.--"Ought you to have done this?" he said over his shoulder.

She fiddled with her gloves.--"To have done what?" she asked nervously.

"To have come here," came in m.u.f.fled tones back. It was evident that he was having to hold himself in.

Then suddenly he wheeled round. This time there was no doubt about it--it was a glare, and a resolute one.

But he had not been able to think of any new line. It was the one he had used before. He made it a little more menacing, that was all.

"I'm only flesh and blood--," he said quickly, his hands ever so slightly clenching and unclenching and his throat apparently swallowing something.

Her heart was beating quickly enough now.--"But--but--," she stammered,--"if you only mean my coming here--I've been here lots of times before----"

He wasted few words on that.

"Not since----," he rapped out. He was surveying her sternly now.

"But--but--," she faltered again, "--it's only me, Edgar--I _am_ connected with the paper, you know--that is to say my husband is----"

"That's true," he groaned.

"And--and--I should have come before--I've been intending to come--but I've been so busy----"

But that also he brushed aside for the little it was worth. "_Must_ you compromise yourself like this?" he demanded. "Don't you see? I'm not made of wood, and I suppose your eyes are open too. Prang may be here at any moment. He'll see that notice on the door, and wait ... and then he'll see you go out. You oughtn't to have come," he continued gloomily.

"Why did you, Amory?"

Once more she quailed before the blue mica of his eye. Her words came now a bit at a time. The victory was his.

"Only to--to see--how the paper was going on--and to--to talk things over--," she said.